


Should werewolves write transformation essays?

by speakinghatsunite



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon-Compliant, Childhood Trauma, Coming of Age, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Marauders Era (Harry Potter), Nightmares, POV Remus Lupin, Vomiting, brave Remus, confused remus, lots of cuddles for the scared, remus doesn't like stealing, sleep problems, slightest bit of wolfstar, unless its chocolate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-16
Updated: 2021-02-16
Packaged: 2021-03-19 00:08:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,576
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29498595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/speakinghatsunite/pseuds/speakinghatsunite
Summary: Growing up, Remus struggles to make sense of the two beings he seems to carry inside. Or that he is. Or how to even word the question.Following Remus over 10 years of childhood and school, canon timeline.
Kudos: 1





	Should werewolves write transformation essays?

**Author's Note:**

> Ok, technically canon Remus gets bitten when he is four, but I wanted him having experienced a bit of normal life. It just makes more sense in my head for his character. So here, he´s seven when he is attacked.

The sight of a huge grey wolf pushing through the window into his small room had been burned into Remus´ mind.When he closed his eyes, he could see the bright wallpaper shining in the light of the full moon, the half-opened windows, the curtains moving slowly in a light breeze. And in this save, cosy world, the red stare of a monster that held him paralysed for a split second before his world succumbed to incomprehensible flashes of pain.

  
He had been old enough to understand the explanations of his parents. But he had not been able to grasp the meaning. He refused to. What the healers had told his parents must be wrong. There was no way he could live a life like that. There was no way he could live through pain like this again.

But the full moon came and when his parents locked him in the basement, Remus felt a sense of abandonment that shattered his willpower like a toy blocks tower. In the dark, he could see the red eyes of the monster again. He knew it was coming for him. As if there had always been a presence in him that he never noticed, he felt something awaken. Like the monster had always been within his subconscious, sleeping, it stirred and Remus felt terrified. He wanted to make it go away, rip this thing out of himself but he didn´t know _how_. The sharp pain from the wound that the beast had left became stronger, deeper and spread. It felt like his blood was boiling and he started to scream. He knew with horrible certainty that he would die and the monster would engulf him, eat him. As the pain became unbearable, he heard his screams turn into a howl.

When he woke up, he was in the hospital again. Through the haze of pain and exhaustion, he realized that it was just like last time. Only now, there was no resolve anymore. He had felt the monster within him. He knew he had seen and smelt and _done_ things, so horrible his memory refused to work. There was no escape.

After being a big boy and sleeping in his own room for years already, he had moved into the bed of his parents again, where he could smell the skin of his mother when she sang to him and held him in her arms. For the next years, every night his parents woke to the screams and sobs of their child.

Remus had also started wetting himself and he was horribly ashamed about it. He had always felt a bit more mature than his friends, reading books from his parents' shelves and roaming outside for hours on his own. But since the attack, he felt as if he had been thrown back in time, into a much younger self.

He was constantly on edge, the shards of his shattered world did not form a picture he could understand or even adjust to, anymore. It felt like everything had changed. The uneasy feeling of his own body, the pain of wounds that would just not heal, the constant awareness of the moon above him, the exhaustion, and the nights that held more pain then he knew he should ever have experienced.

But also something within his parents had changed. An invisible wall had formed between him and his dad and there was a sadness in his mum that she tried to hide, but Remus knew. He could feel it every time they looked at him.

Before, he had loved living at the end of a small village, with the nature around him. He would run over the fields and marvel at the wide-open sky. Now, the empty landscape made him feel exposed. Soon after his first transformation, they had left the house and the friends of his childhood and moved to remote places, constantly changing. Remus felt scared and isolated, stuck in an ever-changing body that he had no chance to learn to control. And he knew deep down, that one night the monster would come and his parents would not find him the next morning, because the beast had eaten him.

  
With coming to Hogwarts, Remus learned another truth about the monster. He had been frightened to leave the safety of his mum´s arms, but he hadn´t expected the fear that came with constantly being surrounded by others. Before the bite, he had enjoyed the friendship of the kids in their village. Now, he was terrified someone might find out that there was a monster inside him. He could feel it stir more regularly as if it could sense the masses of children that were still unharmed. He kept away from others as much as possible and only slept with his head under the pillow so that the boys in his dormitory would not hear him when he dreamed. 

Still, with the time progressing, the steady rhythm of school life brought Remus back into something that felt almost like an ordinary life. Everything about Hogwarts seemed steadfast, from the heavy curtains that surrounded his bed to the thick walls that protected it from the outside world. He had always been a fast learner and the classes gave his restless mind something to settle on. With everyone else complaining about homework, he tried not to show how happy he was with every spell that achieved its goal and every new fact he could soak up. He fell in love with the big library that held answers to almost all questions and found the way into the kitchen where he could eat cookies during sleepless nights. And very slowly, other dreams started to appear. Dreams of warm fires and books and ridiculous spellwork.

But the one thing he was most grateful for was Madame Pomfrey. Professor Dumbledore had introduced her to Remus and his parents before the school started and Remus had immediately felt safe looking at her. She radiated an air of confidence and security that put him at ease. When she told him that she had treated werewolves before, he had finally felt reassured enough to join the school.

In the afternoons before his transformations, he sometimes snuck into the hospital wing, sat hidden on an empty bed and watched her taking care of other students. She had a resolute streak that made her seem stronger than his mother. Remus knew that his mother loved him, but during his last year at home, he had realized that taking care of him was too much on her. But when Madame Pomfrey gave him her warm, strong hand to lead him to the Shrieking Shack, he was not afraid that he would hurt her. Somehow, it felt as if even the beast did not try to prey on her. Sometimes he regained consciousness while she was carrying him back to the castle, and he felt a deep sense of safety from her touch, despite the pain.

His other three saviours were much less expected. He had watched the friendship between the three boys who shared his dormitory develop. James and Sirius, who might have been brothers at this point, were not only brilliant in class but also the most creative troublemakers Hogwarts must ever have seen. They revelled in their cleverness and constantly incited each other to higher levels of mischief. Remus limited himself to private grins, but secretly he wished he could join them. Both made a point to be friendly and invited Remus to sit with them on multiple occasions. But after his constant rejections, they let him be. Instead, Peter joined the duo not much later. Remus was pleasantly surprised that James and Sirius, who sometimes seemed a little arrogant, had no second thoughts about befriending the small, nervous-looking boy.

Observing Peter´s eagerness to contribute, Remus knew deep inside that his own life was only cut out for watching others from the sidelines. The feeling troubled him.  
Being in Hogwarts was a blessing, but he was still different from everyone else. Where could he ever truly fit in with the stirring beast in his chest? He tried to picture a place like that, but his imagination was not strong enough. Maybe his parents were the only people he would ever have a true connection to.

In the years before Hogwarts, he had felt shattered and unable to comprehend even the present. But now, with a fragile sense of control established, he felt the limits of his existence starting to push down on him.  
He tried to read up on the lives of werewolves, whether there was any famous witch or wizard who had shared his condition. But he discovered very little, mostly descriptions of the danger of his kind. _His kind._ He was not a frightened boy, but a beast that was to be found at the later pages of Defense Against the Dark Arts books.

For his next transformation, he borrowed a camera from a Gryffindor girl and took it to the Shrieking Shack, enchanted to take pictures during the night. It was difficult to convince Madame Pomfrey, but eventually, she promised to carry the camera back to the castle.

After seeing the pictures, his dreams started changing.  
Now, in some dreams that made his heart feel like ice, he was the man-wolf climbing through a child´s window. He could see through red eyes and breath the scent of the child sleeping soundly. In his dreams, he could see his own body, strong and covered in dirty grey fur, could feel the ground against his pawns and taste the air with his tongue. And sometimes he would dream himself sneak in on the boys next to him, opening the curtains of their beds and he would awake with a start and pant like he had run, checking himself to make sure his arms were still the arms of a boy.

These were the days when the oh so curious Sirius started to approach him again, always making it seem like a coincidence that he was in the dormitory whenever Remus was or chose the chair next to him. Remus would have given anything to let himself befriend his cheeky dormmate, but the picture of grey fur and red eyes kept him away.

Until one day, the trio had apparently decided that he had no say in the matter. When they appeared for breakfast, they casually took the seats next to him and started chatting. Remus felt awkward, he didn´t want to get up and sit somewhere else. And then James asked him a question and just like that, he was part of their breakfast conversation.

Starting from that morning, it felt like the three were following him around, making jokes, asking for his opinion and giving him a feeling as if he was their friend. Remus knew that he shouldn´t allow it, but he didn´t know how to tell them off. The air of easiness and warmth that surrounded them was so inviting that he felt himself slowly giving in. No words were lost about the flight instinct that sometimes drove him to run away or hide. They seemed to sense that he was unable to fight them off for long.

And then one night when Remus had awoken from another nightmare, he heard a shuffling behind the curtains and Sirius appeared next to him. He had sat down on the mattress and explained with a small voice that Remus wasn´t the only one with bad dreams. And even though none of them wanted to tell the other what it was that scared them, Remus felt a new kind of connection. That night, Sirius had climbed in with him. Instead of feeling horror from the proximity, Remus lay in the dark with a strange sense of security. When he cuddled close to his new friend, the beast within him lay completely silent, as if Sirius could tame it.

And just like that, Remus felt like a normal boy for the first time in five years. His days in Hogwarts had changed completely. He sat with them for breakfast instead of eating alone, he had someone to actually joke with in class instead of only in his own head, and he had friends that would share their latest plans with him and ask for his ideas. Participating in clever pranks that the whole school talked about and sneaking out into dark corridors under James´ cloak was great, but the best was simply to have friends after such a long time.

If only there wouldn´t be the one fact that could destroy everything. At the beginning of their friendship, he had been so happy that the next full moon almost came as a surprise. Only after he had returned after a three-day absence and was met with their questions, he had realised again that being close to others meant an even bigger fear to be found out.

Remus hated lying. He hated how Peter looked at him with sad eyes when he told them about his ill mother, or how James asked more and more questions and he had to add one lie to the next. He could never let them find out. Surely they would be horrified. Even disgusted. He might have to leave Hogwarts, the one place that made him feel safe.

What concerned him most was that after spending more time with them, he realized his friends could discover any secret they set their minds on. Fortunately, Remus was sure that the old school held enough secrets to last them a lifetime. And why should his friends start to investigate something as boring as the supposed disease of his mother?

After a few full moons passed and his friends had stopped asking questions about his monthly absence, Remus allowed himself to relax. Even after he returned with a vile slit across his cheek once, James had only looked at him for a while but not said anything. A small voice in his head told him that he could not rely on his luck forever, but he pushed it aside.  
Ironically, it was the reason for Sirius´ nightmares that was revealed when they had to leave for the summer holidays. It made Remus realize that even though he was a werewolf, there were things he could be very thankful for.

The day they figured him out was the day of the first autumn storm. Remus had been sitting over a transformations essay until there were few people left in the common room. He enjoyed the cosiness near the fireplace, following his thoughts while he listened to the storm howling around the Gryffindor tower. When he had finally entered their dorm, he was surprised to find his friends sitting on his bed, whispering between each other. They stopped talking when he entered. Remus instantly knew that they were going to present him with a new scheme they were extremely proud of. There was no mistaking the maniac glitter in Sirius´ eyes that always appeared before their best pranks. But then Peter happily blurted out the bare ugly truth about _what Remus was_ , and his instincts told him to flee. To run out of their room, the tower, down the many stairs and out, only away from the fact that his life at Hogwarts had come to an end already, that he had so quickly lost his friends, that Dumbledore and his parents would get into trouble because of his stupid, stupid believe that he could be a normal boy.  
But he had stood there, paralysed, and then they had started talking again. And for some damn reason, they didn´t sound like they had just found out he was a horrifying dark creature that could have killed them every night in the last year. They were _excited_. It felt as if he was looking at the three for the first time, grinning at him from their place on his bed, talking to him, but he could not understand. And then James´ face had changed, and he had come over and taken him by the hand – he actually touched him – and sat him on the bed, too. Their voices had slowed down and he had started to grasp parts of what they said. That it was ok, that he should have told them, that having a werewolf friend was exciting, that they were not going to report him. It was ok. They were not going to report him. A feeling had started that he had no name for, that made him want to cry and laugh at the same time and it had pressed a hysterical sound from his lungs. And then he cried for real. He was hugged and held. Under the weight of their three bodies, an incredible freedom washed over him. They were still with him. He was still their friend. He could be Remus, just Remus.

When he had calmed down, the questions started. It was the weirdest thing he had ever experienced. There had always only been adults who knew about it. They used to look at him with grave faces and talked in low voices like the beast was something private, vulgar that one should not inspect too closely. Now, three flushed faces were looking up at him, eager to learn about every little detail. Their questions stung in a new way, but they also made him feel wonderfully free. His friends made him bring up all the things he only wanted to bury in his mind. To him, there was nothing good about the whole thing, but somehow to his friends, it was the most wicked thing ever. He wanted them to understand how dangerous he was, how much it hurt, that he shouldn´t even be sitting here for Merlin´s sake if it wasn´t for Dumbledore. But the flush in their faces remained. Finally, Peter had the idea to make them swear that they would keep "Moony´s" secret. When Remus went to sleep he knew that he had the best friends in the world. And definitely the maddest.

From there on, it was as if an invisible wall had started to break. He had never thought he would have friends he trusted enough to show the pictures of his transformations or allow them to visit him in the hospital wing. Now, they would bring him sweets in the mornings after the full moon, and Peter would make sure to unwrap all chocolate frogs and hand them carefully to Remus. After particularly nasty dreams, Sirius would sit on his bed at night and stroke Remus´ forehead. With the growing trust, he started to feel like a human again, the fears of his future becoming smaller until they were barely there. He was surprised about how happy he could feel, even though there was a monster living within him.

When he went home during the summer holidays, his parents were astonished how their son seemed more confident with every year. Instead of the frightened child they had sent away, Remus had become a teenager with a gentle smile who would sit outside unafraid until the last rays of sunlight disappeared and reading became impossible. To them, it was almost worrisome how self-efficient he had become, taking the steps to the basement with a stoic face and closing the door behind him, so his father could lock it. They would find him in the early morning, unconscious and ripped apart, and levitate him to his room where they attended the wounds with practised hands. When he woke up in the afternoon, the first thing they would see was his smile that was horribly at odds with everything he had just gone through. Now, it had become Remus who would take the hand of his mother to comfort her. But he was truly happy. The beast within him was finally quiet and he enjoyed the silent summer days, feeling a calm that he hadn´t felt in years.

It had become easier now to strike up a conversation with his father when Remus was perched on the fence watching him smoke, and they both had the privilege to look into the distance instead of each other´s eyes. His mother made cocoa in the evenings while he did the washing up, even on the hottest days, and they would sip it together in content silence before he went to sleep. He even invited his friends once, and they spent a fabulous week camping a few fields away and nicking things from the local muggle shops (Remus protested, but not with enough force apparently). After they had left, he spent the next days secretly returning all items he could, including an ugly, neon green hat that was incredibly difficult to squeeze under his jacket.

Remus loved his friends, but there were some things he couldn´t understand about them. One of those things was their hatred for Severus, an unpleasant Slytherin boy with fatty black hair and a pale thin face. Since the beginning of their time at Hogwarts, there had been a strong dislike between James, Sirius and Severus, that had started to grow into passionate hate. Both parties did not waste an opportunity to hex the other. Or, if that was not possible, at least exchange insults and hateful looks.

When Severus started to show a special fascination for the Dark Arts that Sirius so despised, all gloves came off. Also to Remus, the condescending way Severus treated muggle-born children was appalling. By association, he had become a target for Severus´ hexes and wasn´t shy about defending himself. But the length to which his friends went to pick on the boy left him uneasy. He didn´t like that the school stars James and Sirius teamed up to embarrass Severus in front of the biggest audience they could find, and how Peter was the one who cheered the loudest. It hadn´t escaped him that the boy did not even have true friends in his own house.

  
When Remus woke up after another full moon to the marauders and Professor Dumbledore next to his bed, and to Severus, looking at him hateful and disgusted, he immediately knew he had been discovered again. Hearing the events of the night with Dumbledore´s soft voice was too much.  
He had always known that he was dangerous to others, even felt it very real in his chest. But he had pushed the thought so far away into the dark corners of his mind, he hoped never to look at it closely. Except now he knew. He might just have made his first kill as a werewolf. Or passed the disease on to another boy. For a moment he thought his heart would stop from pure horror.  
There would be no punishment that would be great enough. Remus felt his insides go cold. He knew deep down that if he would have bitten Severus, he could not exist anymore. He felt nauseous and got sick, on the white sheets and Professor Dumbledore´s shoes.  
There was no Sirius to calm him this time. Because Sirius stood as far away as possible, not meeting Remus´ eyes. Maybe it had all been a game to him. Using Remus as the perfect weapon to kill a boy he didn´t like. Remus didn´t know what was worse, realizing he was a cold-blooded killer machine to others or learning that the one person he trusted to understand had sold him out in a cruel joke. That Sirius would have made him a murderer just to get back at another kid.

In the next weeks, Remus felt like he couldn´t even stay in the same room as Sirius. At first, James and Peter tried to keep up with them both, running from one to the other. But if this was what having friends meant for him, he was done with it. He wouldn´t make the mistake to trust someone, again. He should have known better from the start. He was a monster, the least he should do was make sure no one else took control of the danger he posed. After a while, it was only James who sat with him in silence or awkwardly shuffled through homework.

During the nights, he sometimes heard Sirius cry. A part of him thought that Sirius deserved it, but he couldn´t stop another, older part hurting at the sound. He wondered if they were wrong all along, whether Sirius actually belonged into Slytherin. Despite everything that had happened, Remus was still ashamed of the thought.

After several weeks, he couldn´t stand it anymore. He couldn´t stand being alone anymore, the lost look James and Peter carried, how Sirius´ cheeky demeanour has crumpled into a ghostly gloom and how heartbroken he sounded at night. Remus felt weak and needy, but on a particularly bad night, he went over to Sirius´ bed and slid under the cover. Sirius´ body shook during sobs and apologies and Remus held him firmly. He didn´t think he could ever understand or forgive Sirius fully, really. But he sensed that Sirius was also scared of a monster that hid in his soul, just like himself. Whether Sirius truly belonged to Gryffindor or Slytherin, he could not give up on him.

At the end of the school year, it had become a tradition that Remus was invited to Professor Dumbledore´s office. He would usually enter, marvel at the sounds and sights that were filling the office, and then make his way over to the delicate-looking sofa that Professor Dumbledore conjured just for the occasion. There always was an assortment of sweets next to a plate of cookies. The headmaster would greet him by pouring them both steaming tea from a beautiful teapot. And then, Professor Dumbledore started to ask him about his year, how he was holding up, in this typical Dumbledore-esque manner, that made Remus feel like they had just met by coincidence on a park bench and were talking about the weather.

He didn´t know why exactly he was invited. Maybe Professor Dumbledore wanted to keep an eye on him, make sure that it was still safe to keep the young werewolf in the school. But whatever the reason, it gave Remus a good feeling that Professor Dumbledore took time off his busy schedule to listen to the worries of a teenage student.

With every year, Remus also felt more sheepish when he stood in front of the gargoyle that would lead him to the office. The headmaster had only ever made offhand comments about the chaos that was brought on the school by the marauders. But in this particular year, Remus was sure that that would not be all.

And really, as soon as he entered the room shouts erupted around him. The portraits of the former headmasters were cursing him, shaking their fists, and he didn´t know whether to be afraid or laugh. It had been a particularly good prank, at least in Remus´ eyes. The map they were creating gave them completely new possibilities. One of them was to know when Dumbledore left his office. They had snuck up at night and given each of the pompous witches and wizards a few more strokes to help their unique beauty shine. Or at least that was how Sirius had put it. When they were finished, many moustaches, piercings, blue eyes, deep cleavages and turgid lips had been added. They wished they could see Dumbledore´s face when he entered the office in the morning.

Now while stepping inside the room, Remus realized he shouldn´t have worried. The portraits still carried all marks that had been left on them that night. Dumbledore´s eyes twinkled and then quietly, he actually thanked Remus for the lesson in interior design. At that point, Remus was convinced that all people who knew about his secret and still liked him were a bit nuts. But he couldn´t bring himself to care.

He received the news that his mother was ill at breakfast, at the beginning of their fourth year. The other three found him in their dormitory, sitting by the window with tear-streaked face.

James and Sirius didn´t even know what cancer was. Maybe it was that. Or maybe it was because James insisted on telling him that everything would end well, when Remus knew from own experience that things didn´t end well just because you bloody tell yourself. Maybe it was the fact that deep down, Remus felt incredibly guilty, because he knew that his mother´s life had been destroyed by her werewolf child. And he had even used the fact as a convenient lie.

From somewhere deep within him, he felt anger like a strong heat rising and the wolf rose with it, but Remus couldn´t care. His vision became red and blurry. He plunged at James who wasn´t taking this _serious_ with his fucking lucky boy attitude and used all his force to punch him, hard. The energy came from deep inside him, guiding his fists. Again and again. He wanted to see James bleeding on the floor. When Peter and Sirius held his arms, he fought against them, too. He felt completely out of his mind, the blood was rushing in his ears and he only wanted to hurt someone, anyone, to stop feeling this fear.

Suddenly he was on the floor, petrified. He lay on the ground for multiple minutes, staring at them hateful, feeling the wolf surge through his veins, wanting to hurt and claw. Then, he started to feel something different, something sober and cool. His consciousness broke through the red cloud, horrified and ashamed, and the wolfish feelings subsided until only his frantic heartbeat stayed from its presence. From the frightened looks of his friends, he knew that they had also seen the wolf.

He returned home to his parents, without having seen James again. Somehow, he had known that his life had been too easy. He wished he could bargain with fate, offer anything to make his mum healthy. But he had too much experience with illness to believe in his wishes. She had looked sick even when he had visited her in summer. Maybe even before he joined school, she had always looked ill after the night he was bitten.

In the short time they still had together, he made sure that she had everything to feel comfortable. He made them cocoa and listened to stories of her youth, old stories of her mother and grandmother and muggle fairytales. She was a great storyteller and he could feel how much it meant to her to pass the memories on, so he listened closely.

It wasn´t until after her death that his dad explained why Remus was bitten. They sat together one evening in the dim light of a few candles, and his father told him how he had incurred the wrath of a werewolf named Greyback, the wolf that bit Remus shortly afterwards. Remus could see the guilt in his dad´s eyes and knew that he should reach over and tell his dad that he did not blame him. But somehow he couldn´t.

That night, Remus lay awake staring at the ceiling. He wasn´t sure if he had too many emotions within him to understand or if he was feeling numb. His mother was gone. The eyes of his dad were pleading for forgiveness. And his soul was merged with a monster that almost killed his best friend. He remembered how after he had first been bitten, he had rejected the idea of leading any kind of life like this. Lying in the dark with tears running over his face, Remus knew that his seven-year-old self had been right. There was no amount of grief or regret that would bring his mother back.

The next day, Remus was surprised to see Peter, Sirius and James at the funeral. He had thought that when he would return to Hogwarts, they would no longer want to be his friends. They looked odd and pale in their dark robes but he was relieved to see James smile at him a little, his face unhurt. He tried to return the smile and felt ashamed.

He had started to dream of himself as the wolf that attacked in the night again, his friends and other students, sometimes people he only saw in his dreams. Madame Pomfrey said that it was completely normal, that he might go berserk in anger but never really hurt someone substantially. But she had not felt his determination to make James suffer that morning.

Remus had become determined to learn everything about werewolves he could. He systematically went through the library again and even searched the books of the forbidden section. He shuddered reading in how many nasty potions werewolf tongues, claws or even testicles were mentioned.

It seemed that werewolves were not seen as part of the society at all. Every book he found listed him as a dark creature, with a clear differentiation from humans. In fact, humans were advised to kill werewolves when they were weakest – between the full moons. Other than that, there was very little written about the time werewolves return to their human form. In older jurisdiction, people were to be killed directly after they had been bitten. In the current law, there was a need to register, inform neighbours and the employer (if a job should be held) and safety regulations for full moon nights. Remus wasn´t even sure if he was registered.

Now, whenever Peter found him reading in the library, he would crack jokes to divert Remus attention. Sirius would insult the authors and every statement made, and James would only look at him with a sad smile and take the book from his hands. He just wished he could talk to someone who shared his fate.

He would still roam around with the others, "re-decorate" the Slytherin room, smuggle Zonko´s articles in the desks of their teachers for some refreshing explosions and plot on how to best pay Filch back. But on weekends, Remus now often went alone to the edge of the Forbidden Forest, standing between the dark trees and trying to concentrate on himself. He hoped to learn more clearly where the borders between Remus and the beast lay.

Sometimes, he had not felt the wolf within him for weeks, except for the full moons. At other times, it was a constant nab at the back of his mind or a sensation in his chest. Seeking inside, Remus found that mostly he was able to tell himself and the wolf apart.

Only sometimes, it would become so blurred that he had difficulty to separate them. Maybe it was connected to the way his body was changing. He had always pictured himself as a vulnerable, small boy compared to the beast, but the man he had started turning into was much more difficult to distinguish from it. He had become taller, with more hair on his body and he was already starting to speak in a darker voice. He would have to develop a new feeling for the part of him that was Remus.

He suspected that the wolf´s presence was somehow connected to his emotions. In a book about wandless magic, he found chapters on the control of thoughts and feelings. With them, Remus practised to restrict the agitation he felt surging in his blood sometimes. He wasn´t sure if it was the way to go, but every so often he could sense the beast calming. Also, chocolate worked surprisingly well to soothe his nerves.

After a few months, Remus had started to practice a more explicit control. He ignited the wrath of the wolf by running, breathing quickly, and hitting the air until he felt a heat surge through him that was not his own. Then he tried to distance himself from it again. At first, it was very difficult and he regained his mind only when his fists bled from hitting trees or from a hard fall after a semi-conscious dash into the forest. Sometimes he plunged into the snow and buried his face in the biting cold for a while to come back to himself. But slowly, his hard labour bore fruit. By the end of the winter, he was able to become completely calm within seconds, even in the hustle of the Great Hall. Remus knew that he probably had no chance if he would get truly angry again, but for the moment the feeling of reassurance was real.

His friends didn´t really understand what he was doing out in the snow for hours, but they could see that something had changed in Remus. He was surprised that even his teachers treated him different now, as if he was older than the others. When their fourth year ended, Remus felt a weird certainty that he had truly left childhood. It was a good feeling.

After an awkward stay with his father during the summer holidays, he was happy to have a fresh start in the new school year. He had been assigned as prefect and was ambitious to take up the responsibility.

Maybe because of his growth spurt during the summer or because of the changes of the last year, authority seemed to come naturally to him. He noticed with private wonder that instead of being afraid, younger students seemed to gain a sense of security when they spoke to him. He was surprised how many first-year students were homesick or afraid they wouldn´t fit in, and how easy it was to find the right words to make them feel better.

To Remus delight, Lily Evans had become a prefect as well. Remus had always suspected that she would be a great person to talk to, but with James´ constant flirting he never had had a chance to get to know her better. Now, sharing their duties, he felt that he had found a new friend. Remus loved the marauders dearly, but it was a nice change to exchange views with someone who listened carefully and thought for a while before speaking. He also valued her assertive side, especially because telling other students off was not something he felt very comfortable with. He only wished he could tell her what he really was, but there was no guarantee she would be as forgiving as his other friends.

In this year, Remus´ workload was high, with normal classes, OWL repetitions, prefect duties, his struggle with the wolf and of course, the life of a marauder. The constant interruptions by the full moon made it hard to keep up with everything. He had no scruples about copying homework from his friends, but they were not the most reliable when it came to even doing theirs and more detention was certainly not what Remus needed.

In a rather depressing hour of career advice, Professor McGonagall had made it clear that although she supported his efforts, he should not get his hopes up too high for any desirable employment. Remus knew she was right, but he could not stop hoping secretly that maybe, the wizarding world could not ignore him if he graduated with outstanding performance.

It wasn´t only a study-intense year for Remus. While he was trying to learn how to limit the wolf´s influence, the others worked on their transformations. From what he had read, it was nearly impossible for them to actually accomplish it, but they went about the whole thing with as much vigour as about the Marauder´s Map. It seemed to Remus almost as if it was another one of those things they would just not let go, a crown jewel of marauder´s pride. And with private humour, Remus assessed that if it was about pride, maybe at least Sirius might make it. At least, whenever Sirius was in their dormitory now, he would sport furry black ears, a wagging tail (he´d even cut a hole in one of his pants) or look at them innocently with a much too long tongue hanging from his mouth.

When for the first time three animals were sitting on the beds as he entered the dormitory and then promptly returned to proud grinning boys, it felt just as unreal as the time they had found him out. But before they would join him in the Shrieking Shack, Remus insisted that they should practice until the transformations would become second nature. He was horrified to imagine that they might somehow not be able to make it while he transformed.

It was an amazing feeling to know that soon, he would not be alone anymore in the one night that nobody had ever been able to share with him. Already, resting with Padfoot cuddled close was an amazing help for the days before the full moon. Somehow he was able to relax deeper with the steady rise and fall of the dog's body next to him.

Peter´s transformation was surprisingly the most useful for their adventures in Hogwarts. As a rat, he found every little crack in the old schools´ walls and they were able to add more and more secret passageways to their map. Peter also provided a continuous flow of the best sweets to them, via his frequent visits to the Honeydukes´ basement. Remus wasn´t really comfortable with eating stolen goods, stuck-up prefect that he was, but his resolve couldn´t hold against the beautiful smell of fresh chocolate.

The night they joined him the first time in their Animagus form, he was more grateful than he could ever tell them. When he woke up in the hospital wing, he saw his friends sitting at his bed, Sirius mocking James about how he had apparently got stuck between some trees with his antlers. Even though he was horribly groggy, Remus could not have felt happier. It wasn´t just him throwing himself against the beast with all his might. It was all four of them.

They even teased him about the wolf and he was surprised to hear them talking with fondness, as if they had babysitted a toddler and not a murderous beast. The transformation had been painful as always, but for once no bones were broken, no parts of flesh ripped out and there were no wounds that would take forever to heal. Instead, his friends had wounds that had to be closed with dittany and powdered silver in the privacy of their dormitory, but they didn´t accept any apologies from him.

Over the next month, Remus noticed that the wolf within him had become much calmer. Instead, an astonishing change happened. Sometimes he was able to feel a strong burst of happiness that he knew was not his own. It was crazy to imagine the beast could feel just as happy about the new company as he was. Slowly, it seemed as if they had found a way to tame the lycanthropy from a soul-eating ever-present monster into a bad disease. Every time he woke up after the full moon he knew that instead of memories of ripping at his own flesh, he could now dream of the feeling of running freely, the fresh air streaming over his muzzle, the smells of the Forbidden Forest, and his friends jumping around him, guiding him.

At least by their sixth year, Remus observed that there was a new infection going around, and while this time he was not endangered, at least half of his classmates were. Between the kissing couples that could always be seen in the hallways, there now were a lot of people he knew. It was almost comical how everyone was in search of their soulmate, while Remus Lupin remained in search of his soul.

James infatuation with Lily had become even worse and Remus wasn´t sure if James was just insensitive to ignore her cold attitude or if he really was onto something there. Peter kept looking wistfully at different girls and if Sirius could be trusted, he just took every opportunity he got. And Remus had to admit that he looked devilish good, so there were probably a lot of them. One rainy afternoon, even Remus found himself in an empty corridor with Sirius´ lips on his. From the way Sirius had blushed afterwards and avoided his eyes, Remus got the feeling that he had been exaggerating big time, but he didn´t say anything.

And then came the one class he had dreaded since his first year at Hogwarts – the class in which they covered werewolves. He already knew everything books could tell him, so he expected a lecture about the dangers of werewolves and a few insulting remarks from his classmates. Nothing he couldn´t understand or handle. What he wasn´t prepared for though was his best friends´ determination to turn the class into a more entertaining (and embarrassing) event. Remus decided to stare at his hands while Sirius and James expanded on whether and how werewolves could mate with humans, making their teacher stutter and Remus´ ears turn red.

Even though he wanted to strangle the two afterwards, he secretly observed that he had learned a few important things. His teacher didn´t know much more than the books. But he had supposed that a werewolf in human form would be able to "mate" with a girl, as Sirius had so charmingly put it. So theoretically, Remus might be able to become a father. As expected, there were no reported cases and nothing was known about the hereditability of lycanthropy. Remus thought that of course, nobody in their right mind would let a beast this close.

The following night he lay awake again, looking at the ceiling of his bed. He had not really thought yet about being with a girl, much less of becoming a father. Now he was certain that those were aspects of life he wouldn´t experience. He wasn´t sure how he felt about it. A part of him was relieved. He knew it was for the best, it was difficult enough to handle himself. But as he turned on his side to finally go to sleep, he also felt a deep sadness. However human he might feel at the moment, there was no way anyone would accept a werewolf partner.

Even though Remus had been determined to fully concentrate on his grades in the last year, things had started changing outside Hogwarts and no one could ignore that. It seemed that the feeling of disquiet that had settled in the wizarding community in the last years had not been without cause. Something bad had started happening.

Now, every morning after James read the headlines to them, Remus searched for less prominent articles about disappearing children or werewolf attacks that had started to appear frequently. As the year progressed, news about coordinated werewolf attacks on entire villages started to fill the headlines. And one day, there was a picture of "Britain´s most dangerous werewolf", Fenrir Greyback.

Seeing him for the first time came as a shock. Remus didn´t know what he had expected. Since he had known that the wolf who bit him had done it deliberately, he had only felt disgust for him. He had never wanted to learn more about the man, but suddenly there was a picture in the middle of a peaceful morning in the Great Hall where the eggs had funny warming covers and Sirius complained about the homework for Slughorn with his feet perched on the table.

Greyback looked horrifying, even worse than the monster he still saw in his dreams. In the photograph, he bared his teeth showing rows of sharp yellow weapons. He has sharpened them, Remus realized. To rip flesh from children´s bones. Remus had to run to make it to the toilet.

He wished he would be stronger. He wanted to protect every kid from this. But he knew that if he would stand guard at a child´s window at the full moon, he would happily join this man. He threw up. His head hurt. Greyback was the complete antithesis to everything Remus wanted from his life. Was this how werewolves were? Why did Remus feel so different? Was this how he really was, deep inside? In all these long concentration sessions, what would have happened had he encouraged the beast? Would he start to look like this when he became older? He had read that the werewolf who passed on the condition also passed his personality. Then maybe, all attempts for control were in vain. Remus touched the long rounded wound that had never healed completely and felt it throb. The curse of Greyback run through his blood. For the first time, he agreed with the DADA books. Greyback could just not be human. But that must mean that Remus was neither.

He didn´t know how long he had been sitting on the cold floor of the toilet cabin when he felt a hand on his back. James knelt down next to him with a concerned face. Remus knew that he didn´t deserve such friendship, not after he had attacked James just like Greyback would have. But James held him through his sobbing and stammered apologies, and he was more grateful to his friend than he would ever be able to show.

The bad news from outside Hogwarts seemed to permeate the walls of the school, too. Remus had the impression that now he could see Slytherin students whispering and exchanging excited looks everywhere. Hidden attacks that targeted muggle-born students had become more frequent and violent and it felt as if the corridors of the school were a secret battlefield.

Severus wore such a confident knowing smile now that it sent shivers down Remus´ spine, especially after he saw him use a spell that sliced through the arm of a smaller Ravenclaw girl like a knife through butter. There was a dangerous look on his face whenever he looked at Remus as if he couldn´t wait to include a werewolf´s head to his list of triumphs.

Even the teachers seemed alarmed. Rumours had started spreading about an uprising of dark wizards. With Sirius as a friend, they didn´t need to rely on rumours alone. It was surprising that there was something else that could make Remus as anxious as the wolf. He had never thought that the horrors that haunted Sirius´ childhood would one day become reality for him, too.

Their last year in Hogwarts came to an end and Remus graduated with excellent grades. He already knew that in the new climate his chances for employment were more than dim. But as the world seemed to become darker day by day, there was a new calling that was more important than all worries about his personal future. All of them knew that just like they tried to look out for their fellow students now, they could also not stand by if their world would succumb to a war.  
And as unlikely as it may be for a werewolf, Remus was determined to fight the darkness.


End file.
